UTEP still has faith its offense will turn into something special in the final seven games.

The veteran unit was good last year and has most everything back, so turning that potential into reality shouldn't be an overwhelming hill.

Through five games, though, that offense has been broken and it's perfectly summed up with the Miners' stunning lack of efficiency on third down.

After a 2-of-13 showing last Saturday at East Carolina, UTEP now ranks 116th nationally on third-down conversions at 27 percent. Any formula for turning around the 1-4 start, a process that begins Saturday at home against SMU, begins with fixing the third-down issues.

"We need to focus on sustaining drives," receiver Mike Edwards said. "We have to stay on the field on third downs."

To throw out another stat, in the first three quarters of both the Wis consin and East Carolina games, UTEP was 2-for-20 on third down.

In many ways, the third-down conversion statistic is the best indicator of how an offense is doing. Besides the obvious merits of converting them to keep a drive going, it is also a measure of how productive a unit is on the other downs. Against East Carolina, UTEP needed an average of 6.5 yards on its third downs, and that's not a winning formula.

"It makes a difference what you do on first and second down just as much," coach Mike Price said. "We focus on third down a lot. Maybe we need to focus on first and second down so it's not third-and-long."

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When asked what specific things the offense needs to do better, Price was cagey.

"I wouldn't want to give away my game plan," he said. "There are some things."

One logical answer would be to throw the ball more to a tight end corps that was billed as the team strength. One ball was thrown to a tight end against ECU and it was incomplete.

"I didn't want that to be a question that was going to be asked," Price said of the reason more passes didn't go to tight ends. "Obviously the fact that they caught no passes last week was a mistake."

The players, though, talked in general terms. UTEP devotes a big chunk of Wednesday practices to third downs, where managers bring out chains and the Miners go through just about every possible third-down distance.

"We need to execute," Edwards said. "We practice third downs every Wednesday. Now, we need to carry it over to the games.

"It's a team effort. I can't really point out any individuals or anything, we just need to do better as an offensive unit. We can't get three turnovers (like they did against East Carolina) and not capitalize. We need to do better."

Indeed, the problems against ECU were spread out. On UTEP's first series, they failed on a middle run in what was their only third-and-1 of the game. Several times quarterback Nick Lamaison threw high over the head of an open receiver. Another time a receiver didn't make the proper read on a blitz, leading to an interception.

While UTEP ran the ball well on average, there were enough failed first- and second-down runs to create third-and-longs. On top of all that, the Miners haven't shown big-play explosiveness in terms of scoring from distance, so sustaining drives has become more important.

"We have it in us to make plays," receiver Jordan Leslie said. "Now we've got to figure out how to do it. We have to play better as a team. You can see glimpses of big plays, we just have to get better every day. We have to get better on third down."

"Little things," Lamaison said. "Details. Executing like we can. We have to continue to get better. That's what (Tuesday's practice) is all about, getting better.

"It's been a lack of focus, a lack of focus throughout the game, a lack of focus for four quarters. We have to get better with that."

The 1-4 record should serve to hone that focus. Any margin of error has gone, buried in a sea of third-down mistakes.

Bret Bloomquist may be reached at bbloomquist@elpasotimes.com; 546-6359. Follow him on Twitter @bretbloomquist.

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